The Steptoe Alethiometer
by Old Toad
Summary: Harold discovers a Golden Compass hidden in the house, which prompts Albert to tell his son the strange truth about his (Harold's) mother.


It was the best of times: after lunch on a Sunday. Old Albert Steptoe had had a large lunch and was happy to sleep it off, sprawled out flat in his particular armchair. The horse had been seen to, and it was Harold's turn to do the washing up. If he had his way it would always be Harold's turn.

Harold, however, had a new project. He was going methodically through the house, starting in the attic, looking for saleable junk and throwing out rubbish. As the family business was 'recycling', or as his father put it: "we are in the rag-and-bone trade and have been since before I was born," there was a mountain of it to go through. There was an awful lot of rubbish and a lot of junk, very little of which had any real value. So far he had turned up a few items, but only one find that just might bring in some significant cash: a set of books beautifully bound in real leather. He thought they must be hundreds of years old. Once he had properly cleaned off the grime and mould from the bindings he would be taking them up the Charring Cross Road to see what the book dealers would offer him for them. No point in showing them to his father.

Then he made his big discovery: a little cloth bag containing what appeared to be a large gold pocket watch. One glance was enough; he was down the loft ladder to find his father.

"Dad, dad, look what I found! I reckon it's gold, feel the weight of it!" Harold was shouting as he came through the door. "Lovely workmanship too," he added, peering closely at it in the better light, and frowning with puzzlement now that he had bothered to look properly at the dial for the first time. He muttered "Chinese?" to himself and then decided to ignore its origin and concentrate on its value.

His father was beginning to stir. "Look at this Dad! DAD!" The old man peered up at his enthused son with bleary, suspicious eyes. He put on his wheedling, hard-done-by voice: "What do you what to go disturbing an old man for, 'Arold? You know I need my rest; I'm worn out from a lifetime of grinding toil. And the 'orse don't look after itself you know. I'm the one who …"

"Dad, will you take a look at this; it could be worth a fortune, and it was right under our noses."

"Where did you find it?" Albert had still not looked at what his son was waving under his nose.

"Up in the attic."

"Oh, 'up in the attic' _and_ 'under our noses', eh? Which was it?" Albert was now properly awake and properly annoyed. "In the loft? You haven't been going through your poor, dear mother's things 'ave you Harold?"

"Just look at it Dad, feel its weight. It has got to be gold!"

The old man felt around for his reading glasses and fixed them in place with deliberate slowness. Only then did he condescend to take the shiny, golden object from his son.

"Brass! That's what it is: brass! Can't you tell brass from gold yet?"

"But Dad, it's been up there years, since before the blitz, and it's as shiny as new. How can it be brass?"

"Lacquered. Quality though, I'll give you that. …. Very nice. Should be worth a bob or two." Albert rose and fished a magnifying glass from a draw. "'Taint a watch, though. Some sort of foreign compass, maybe? Why can't they have a proper North an' South like us?" He held it in front of his face, watching the needle move about. "Maybe it's both a clock and a compass: it's got three hands and a needle what moves about."

Harold was getting more and more excited. "If it is a compass there's a sure test. We must have a magnet somewhere." He dashed from the room in a frantic hunt for one.

While he was gone, his father set the compass down on the table and sat in a dining chair staring at it. Suddenly it clicked and he knew exactly what it was. There was a sad quaver in his voice when his son came back, still hunting for a magnet. "Don't bother, son, I know exactly what this is: it's your mother's Golden Compass. Put it back where you found it and keep quiet about it."

"Dad?" Harold was instantly deflated, and collapsed into the other dining chair. "Dad, you can't leave it at that. Tell me about Mother. What is this thing?"

"It was her 'Golden Compass.' Spent hours bent over it she did. She didn't want it getting into the wrong hands. Made me promise to hide it after she was gone."

"Hide it? What is it?"

"It … it answers questions. You have to hold it like this and set the little hands and then the needle moves around to give the answer. She showed me, but I could never get the hang of it."

"That's balmy. I can't believe that my mother would try and trick people with that sort of fairground nonsense."

"No trick, Harold. You mustn't laugh, this is serious. It _did_ answer questions - if you knew how to use it. She had big books which helped her understand it. I would come in from the round and find her at this very table with the Compass in front of her and books open all over the table. I dunno why I didn't recognize it at once. …. Ere, you havn't seen those books have you?"

"Might have."

"'Course you 'ave! I don't need any compass to read you like a book. Bring 'em down and then you'll see."

"OK, I will, but what sort of questions did it answer? What's the name of the Prime Minister? Or, what horse is going to win the Grand National? Or, err, what colour scheme should I go for when I repaint the house?"

"None of those, or maybe the last, I dunno. But it didn't do fortune telling, and it weren't no good with names."

"So what use was it?"

"Well, I'd bring back things on the cart, and your mother would tell me which was valuable and which was rubbish."

"So could anyone with a bit of nous."

"Don't knock it, Harold. Those were hard times; it made a big difference to us."

"What else?"

"When there was a poker game on, she could tell who was bluffing. … She wouldn't do it, though," Albert sighed.

"Mother was a woman of principle, she wouldn't allow cheating."

"It wasn't that, Harold. She just refused to let anyone see it. … Anyway, it was too slow and would have been bleeding obvious."

"Is that all?"

"Well, no. But she could 'ave done a lot more with it if she wasn't afraid to let anyone know she had it. … She knew you was a boy long afore you were born – that was quite somethin' in those days."

"It's a pity she didn't use it to find out what was wrong with her."

"Oh, Harold, don't go into that again." Albert's face was crumpled in misery.

"Sorry Dad, I didn't mean to – you know – drag up painful memories."

"Not your fault, son, and perhaps it's time you knew the whole story."

Harold always wanted to know more about the long-dead mother he could barely remember and always idolised. "Tell you what Dad, I'll make us a cup of tea and you can tell me all about it."

"Good idea. Proper tea mind: you know how I like it, none of that poncey China stuff."

Half way to the kitchen, Harold grinned to himself. "Yes Dad."

A large mug of strong, sweet tea and a couple of Jaffa Cakes later, Albert Steptoe was ready to tell all:

"Your mother was not from round her, Harold, you know that don't you." Harold nodded. "She used to tell people she was from the Isle of Man, but that weren't so. She was a runaway from another world altogether."

"She wasn't Jewish, Dad, or Portsmouth Brethren or some such?"

"That's not what I meant. Your mother was a proper Christian lady. But she was not of this world."

"Oh, she came from Oz did she, or Wonderland?"

"I'm serious, Harold. Who do you think made that Compass thing and wrote them books? Your mother brought them with her when she escaped. That's why she wouldn't let anyone see it - in case she was found."

"She was a thief on the run, my mother?"

"It wasn't like that. It was her job, using that Compass, and she was good at it. But she didn't like the questions she had to work on. They were nasty types her bosses, made the Nazis seem like Quakers."

Harold leaned in closer, fascinated, as his father unconsciously lowered his voice.

"She used the Compass to help other people, ordinary people, and that got her into trouble. She learnt from it that she was going to be arrested. She told me the best thing she ever did with it was to find a way of escape. She took the Compass and books and slipped through a hidden 'window' between her world and this."

Albert stopped to see how his son was taking these revelations. Harold was beaming, very much liking the idea of his mother as a heroine, a freedom fighter fleeing persecution. "Go on Dad!"

"So she arrived in this world with the Golden Compass, those heavy books, and the clothes she stood up in – oh, and her squirrel."

"EH?"

"She made out it was her pet. She was devoted to it and never went anywhere without it. Most people never even noticed it. I did though, and I got jealous of it 'til I knew better."

"Knew what?"

"Never you mind, it was summat personal to her, somethin' from her world we don't have in this. When she passed away the squirrel went too – just vanished. … You asked why she didn't ask the Compass about her illness; well she did."

"And?"

"It told her that because this was not her world she was slowly dying, the only cure was to go back. Well she wouldn't do that, not least because you had been born. She wasn't going to leave you, and if she had taken you, you would die."

Father and son sat silently contemplating her gallantry and their loss. Albert finally broke the silence: "The reason I'm still hiding the Compass is because I promised her I would as she lay dying.

"Why Dad, what was she afraid of?"

"I think her mind was going towards the end, but I made her a solemn promise and I'm going to stick with it."

"Good for you, Dad. I'll go and put it all back where I found it."

"There's more, Harold. I shan't be here for ever and you need to know. She said that a man would come here looking for it. He would ask for it by its proper name, and I should give it to him. I would know him 'cause he would have a big cat with him, some sort of leopard."

"Yes, that would mark him out. No wonder you thought her mind was going."

"She said she knew all this because an angel had told her."

They shook their heads in sorrow, both close to tears.

"She even told me this man's name. I got it writ down somewhere. It was like that washing powder – you know – Ariel, or sommat like that."

"The Compass, Dad, what's its proper name?"

"Ah, I can remember that. It's called an 'ale-leafy-o-meter', on account of it tells the truth – or so she said. Poor woman."

"Poor Mum."

THE END


End file.
